Can anyone recommend some books on the Viking age and general ancient Norse culture?

by ADubiousGenius

I want to learn all that I can about ancient Norse culture and was hoping some of the people here could recommend historically accurate and factual books. Thanks.

white_light-king

The AH book list recommended "The Viking World" and I thought it was pretty readable and informative.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/books/europe#wiki_middle_ages

Steelcan909

If its a general survey that you're interested in, and not in depth scholarly analysis of one particular site or style of brooch, I'd recommend you start off with Gywn Jones's A History of the Vikings. It provides a cursory overview of the Scandinavian world in the Viking Age and the immediate aftermath. I would pair this with Peter Heather's Empires and Barbarians for additional context on the time frame just before the Viking Age. He does not deal exclusively with the Norse, but it is useful for framing the Viking age within the context of the "migrations" of Late Antiquity.

If you're more interested in the mythology of the Norse, Davidson's Gods of Northern Europe is a somewhat dated but still widely used book. If you're more interested in women's life in Norse society you'll want Jenny Jochens's Women in Old Norse Society

EyeStache

Jones, Davidson, and Jochens' books have already been mentioned as excellent surveys, as is Brink's book.

If you're looking for something quicker and easier to digest as an entry point, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings by Peter Sawyer is great, as is The Viking Age: A Reader by Angus Somerville and Andrew McDonald (fair notice - I'm biased for this one, since Angus and Andrew were my undergrad advisors.)

If you're looking for legal stuff, I cannot recommend highly enough Bloodtaking and Peace Making by William Ian Miller.

Read the sagas, of course, especially the Islendingasögur - Egils saga, Njáls saga, and Grettis saga are the most popular for a reason, but stuff like Eyrbryggja saga, Hrafnkels saga, and Víga-Glúms saga are great, too. Jane Smiley edited an English-language collection for Penguin called simply The Sagas of Icelanders. Kings sagas are a bit tougher to find in contemporary translation, but there are loads of free ones online, and Sverris saga is one of my favourites.

truupe

Kirsten Wolf's Viking Age: Everyday Life During the Extraordinary Era of the Norseman gives a good account of the various aspects of Viking culture and everyday life.

BTW, it's part of a 4 book Everyday Life series featuring Ancient Greek, Ancient Egyptian, and Medieval European as well as Viking. I have all 4...only read the Greek one so far and enjoyed it.